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Demography, family, and gender

Population characteristics strongly predict labor market success. One of the biggest economic changes has been the rise of women in the labor market. The upcoming demographic imbalances suggest substantial adjustment processes on labor markets around the globe. The articles in this subject area provide evidence relating the role of demography in social, cultural, and biological processes to their effects on worker well-being.

Higher levels of air pollution reduce worker
productivity, even when air quality is generally low

Environmental regulations are typically
considered to be a drag on the economy. However, improved environmental
quality may actually enhance productivity by creating a healthier workforce.
Evidence suggests that improvements in air quality lead to improvements in
worker productivity across a range of sectors, including agriculture,
manufacturing, and the service sectors. These effects also arise at levels
of air quality that are below pollution thresholds in countries with the
highest levels of environmental regulation. The findings suggest a new
approach for understanding the consequences of environmental
regulations.

The link between air pollution and human health
is well-documented in the epidemiology and economic literature. Recently, an
increasing body of research has shown that air pollution—even in relatively
low doses—also affects educational outcomes across several distinct age
groups and varying lengths of exposure. This implies that a narrow focus on
traditional health outcomes, such as morbidity and mortality, may understate
the true benefit of reducing pollution, as air pollution also affects
scholastic achievement and human capital formation.

Excessive drinking is the main cause of high
male mortality rates, but the problem can be addressed

Eastern European countries, particularly former
Soviet Union economies, traditionally have the highest rates of alcohol
consumption in the world. Consequently, they also have some of the highest
male mortality rates in the world. Regulation can be effective in
significantly decreasing excessive drinking and its related negative
effects, such as low labor productivity and high rates of mortality.
Understanding the consequences of specific regulatory measures and what
tools should be used to combat excessive alcohol consumption is essential
for designing effective policies.

Immigrants tend to be healthier than native
residents when they arrive—an advantage that dissipates with time

In common anti-immigrant rhetoric, concerns are
raised that immigrants bring diseases with them to the host country that
threaten the health of the resident population. In reality, extensive
empirical research over several decades and across multiple regions and host
countries has documented that when immigrants arrive in the host country
they are healthier than native residents, a phenomenon termed the “healthy
immigrant effect.” This initial advantage deteriorates with time spent in
the host country, however, and immigrants’ health status converges toward
(or below) that of native residents.

Patterns of labor market assimilation for
married immigrant women are similar to those for men

What is the role of married women in immigrant
households? Their contribution to the labor market has traditionally been
considered of secondary importance and studied in the framework of temporary
attachment to the labor force to support the household around the time of
arrival. But this role has changed. Evidence from major immigrant-receiving
countries suggests that married immigrant women make labor supply decisions
similar to those recently observed for native-born married women, who are
guided by their own opportunities in the labor market rather than by their
spouses’ employment trajectories.

Despite the large returns from an attractive
appearance, the cost-effectiveness of investment in beauty is ambiguous

Being beautiful gives a person an advantage in
many settings. Attractive people earn more and have an easier time getting
hired. People spend large amounts of money on goods and services to enhance
their beauty. Is this enhancement worth pursuing? Research suggests that the
expected improvement in beauty from these goods and services is limited.
Therefore, despite the large returns from having an attractive appearance,
the cost-effectiveness of investment in beauty enhancement is ambiguous. For
the average person, the monetary benefits of plastic surgery, medical
treatments to increase height, and expensive clothing are not worth the
cost.

Government policies can have a modest effect on
raising fertility—but broader social changes lowering fertility are
stronger

Since 1989 fertility and family formation have
declined sharply in Central and Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union.
Fertility rates are converging on—and sometimes falling below—rates in
Western Europe, most of which are below replacement levels. Concerned about
a shrinking and aging population and strains on pension systems, governments
are using incentives to encourage people to have more children. These
policies seem only modestly effective in countering the impacts of
widespread social changes, including new work opportunities for women and
stronger incentives to invest in education.

The success of universal preschool education depends crucially
on the policy parameters and specific country context

Since the 1970s, many countries have established free or highly
subsidized education for all preschool children in the hope of improving children’s learning
and socio-economic life chances and encouraging mothers to join the labor force. Evaluations
reveal that these policies can increase maternal employment in the short term and may continue
to do so even after the child is no longer in preschool by enabling mothers to gain more job
skills and increase their attachment to the labor force. However, their effectiveness depends
on the policy design, the country context, and the characteristics of mothers of
preschoolers.

The economic and psychological literatures have
demonstrated that early investments (private and public) in children can
significantly increase cognitive outcomes in the short and long term and
contribute to success later in life. One of the most important of these
inputs is maternal time. Women’s participation in the labor market has risen
rapidly in most countries, implying that mothers spend less time with their
children and that families rely more on external sources of childcare. This
trend has raised concerns, and an intense debate in several countries has
focused on the effectiveness of childcare policies.

A range of other policies and changes are needed
for childcare expansion to increase mothers’ labor supply

In 2002, the EU set targets for expanding
childcare coverage, but most of the post-socialist countries are behind
schedule. While childcare expansion places a heavy financial burden on
governments, low participation in the labor force by mothers, especially
those with children under the age of three, implies a high potential impact.
However, the effectiveness of childcare expansion may be limited by some
common characteristics of these countries: family policies that do not
support women’s labor market re-entry, few flexible work opportunities, and
cultural norms about family and gender roles shaped by the institutional and
economic legacy of socialism.